Dusseldorf

town prince electoral prussia

DUSSELDORF, a town of Prussia, at the head of a government in the province of the Rhine, on the right into four portions, - the Old Town, the Karlstadt, which dates from 1787 and is called after the electoral prit.ce Charles Theodore, the New Town, which was in process of formation from 1690 to 1716, and the Friedrichsstadt, laid out within recent years. New streets are rapidly stretching out in all directions, and the villages of Pempelfort, Bilk, and Derendorf are already almost in-corporated. "Within the area of the town proper there are numerous open grounds and public squares, which prevent the regularity of its plan degenerating into monotony : the market-place, with the colossal bronze statute of the electoral prince Johann Wilhelm, the parade, the A114 Strasse, the King's Alley, and the King's Platz may be specially mentioned. Of the ten churches the most notice-able are - St Andrew's, formerly the Jesuit or court church, with frescoes by Hubner, Deger, and Mucke, and the embalmed bodies of several of the electors ; St Lambert's, with a tower 180 feet high, and containing monuments in honour of Duke William IV. and Voetius ; and Maximilian's, with frescoes by Settegast and alters. Besides the old ducal palace, laid in ruins by the French in 1794, but restored in 1846, the secular buildings comprise the former Jesuit college, now occupied by the administrative offices, a town-house dating from 1567, a. penitentiary, a lunatic asylum, several hospitals and infirmaries, a theatre completed in 1875, a music hall, a gymnasium, and a polytechnical school. The town also possesses a, library of 50,000 volumes, and is the seat of a great number of commercial and intellectual associations ; but to nothing is it more indebted for its celebrity than to the Academy of Painting. This famous institution, originally founded by the electoral prince Charles Theodore in 1767, was reorganized by K ing Frederick William in 1822, and has since attained a high degree of prosperity as a centre of artistic culture. From 1822 6111826 it was under the direction of Cornelius, a native of the town, from 1826 to 1859 under Schadow, and from l 859 to 1864 under Bendemann. From Bendemann's resignation it con-tinued in the hands of a body of curators till 1873, when Wiscelinus of Weimar was chosen diredor. The noble collection of paintings which formerly adorned the Dusseldorf gallery was removed to Munich in 1805', and has not since been restored ; but there is no lack of artistic treasures in the town. 'The academy possesses 14,000 original drawings and sketches by the great masters, 24,000 engravings, and 248 water-colour copies of Italian originals ; the municipal gallery contains valuable specimens of the local school; and the same is the case with the Schulte collection. The principal names are Cornelius, Lessing, Achenbach, Baur, Tidemann, and Knaus. An annual exhibition is held under the auspices of the Art Union; and the members of the Artist's Society, or Malkasten, as they are. called, annually celebrate festivities and masquerades of a remarkable description. Not only is Dusseldorf situated in the greatest manufacturing province of Prussia, but it is itself the seat of various important industries, - cotton and carpet weaving, iron-founding, wire-drawing, sugar-refining, brewing, distillation, and the making of pianos and carriages. The surrounding country is largely devoted to market-gardening, and the Diisseldorf mustard is in special repute. A very extensive trade is carried on both by river and by rail; the port was declared free in 1829, and is consequently one of the most frequented on the Rhine. The Diisseldorf Steam-boat Company maintains regular communication with Mayence on the one hand and Rotterdam on the other. A little to the north of the town lies the village of Diisselthal, with Count Pecke Volmarstein's establishment for homeless children in the former Trappist monastery; and in the suburban village of Pempelfort is the Jiigerhof, the residence at one time of Prince Frederick of Prussia, and aftprwards of the prince of Hohenzollern Sigmaringen. In 1780 the number of inhabitants was about 8000 ; by 1831 it was over 23,000. The census of 1861 gave 41,290 (of which 3376 were military) ; that of 1871, 69,348.

Dtisseldorf, as the form of the name-the village on the Diissel -clearly indicates, was long a place of small consideration. In 1288 it was raised to the rank of a town by Count Adolf of Berg; from his successors it obtained various privileges, and in 1385 was chosen as their residence. After it had suffered greatly in the Thirty Years' War and the war of theSpanish succession, it recoveted. its prosperity under the patronage of the electoral prince John William of the Palatinate, who dwelt in the castle till the restoration of Heidelberg. In 1794 the town was violently bombarded by the French; and after the peace of Luncville it was deprived of its forti-fications. In 1805 it became the capital of the Napoleonic duchy of Berg ; and in 1815 it passed with the duchy into Prussian posses-sion. Among its celebrities are Georg,e and Friedrich Heinrich Jakobi, Schenk, Henie, Yarnhagen, Cornelius, Camphausen, and H. von Sybel.

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